Northside Wines — Restaurant in Melbourne

This is the third time I’ve been here. The first two times I wanted to believe in what our community has said about Northside wines. Tonight we wanted to give them another go, hoping for a delightful and enjoyable experience. To start with, the waiter that greeted us was abrupt and dismissive even though we had a reservation. She sat us in the darkest part of the room even though there were many unfilled tables. Bless the waiter that looked after us for bringing out more candles and validating our thoughts about the darkness by even asking why we had been seated so far away. Ordering was great and our section waiter understood our vibe for the evening and what we hoped to experience. ……. And then the food came. We ordered enough food to think that we would be full. The whipped feta licks the bowl - didn’t fill it. It was lacking in flavour and there were more crispy pieces of dried up bread than in a Caesar salad. Next came the chicken - 3 measly pieces of barely seasoned, smaller than kfc tenders sized “organic” chicken for $17. If I thought I knew how to be ripped off, I’d just learnt a new lesson. Orange is the new black? Incorrect, tiny chicken for stupid amounts of money is the new black. Honestly, even a 6 pack of McNuggets at 3 in the morning is more value than this. All hope was not lost. Until the cauliflower came out. For a vegetable that’s in season, and cheap when you buy it in store - why did it cost me $17 for 6 florets?! That were undercooked and unseasoned. My air fryer does a better job at cooking - and it’s unqualified. Now let’s talk about the chorizo. Save yourself the money and the time and order chorizo from Spain because at least it will be cooked better than whatever we were served with raw pineapple and in its own oily juices. I’m not done, but I wish I was. Let’s move onto the braised beef cheek. Says carrot purée- more like carrot NO WAY. No flavour, just there for colour. The beef was so mushy that you could not tell if it was an animal or a mushroom. The ‘jus’ was purely a lathering of an offensive amount of flavours to distract you from the fact that they bought the cheapest cut of meat but decided to charge $36 for it. Food can be excusable (if you’re not paying such a stupid amount of money for it). The worst part was that despite our one server who seemed to care, the supposed ‘manager’ doesn’t know how to speak to customers, let alone serve them a corked bottle of wine without proper procedure in a venue that calls themselves ‘Northside Wines’. Our food came out super quick (horrifyingly quick) but the worst part about that was that no one asked us how it was going during courses, between courses - or after our drinks were served. It was only when they wanted to gouge us for more overly priced desserts or more drinks that we got any attention. For the amount of people in the room, they were not understaffed, they were just useless (brutal, but true). That same person that calls herself a manager, when we raised our issues, brushed them off and said that she has no control over it. No apology. We won’t be back. Pretty sad tbh. It’s not a personal dig because we have worked in the industry for 10 years. The most disappointing part of this experience is that we are super forgiving and generous customers when we have the chance to go out. For one night when we get the chance to get to be the customer, we feel so let down that we have to leave a review like this, because when we tried to raise it in house, we felt that our concerns weren’t acknowledged. We also love to be bursting at the seems in both food & drinks, and today were now looking for dessert...

Anyone that has read any review I write it's really rare I give under 5⭐️ I had read about the bottomless $49 per head for small plates tapas online. From the minute we sat down we were told the conditions of this menu. They were as follows : you have 1.5 hours. But they select the first 5 choices and bring them to you slowly. Then only after you complete those. You can choose and order any others. By the time we were served the 5 dishes we had been there one hour and 20 minutes. The waitress who was lovely apologised and said order what you like sorry we were slow. So we ordered the small plates oysters. She proceeded to tell us they weren't included. So we ordered three more things and that's was all. The food was very average. No dish stood out. The chicken they chose as one of the dishes was really undercooked so we didn't eat it. We let her know and she came back and said the chef checks the temperature and they are all done perfectly. That's fine but the table next to us that was a large group left all there 4 chickens as well. The place was packed with various functions. So it was extremely loud. For us we wouldn't return. I will say that the lady that served us was lovely and professional. For three of it was $190 and we had one glass of wine and two mocktails. I would suggest if you go to choose your own or do the two courses rather than the bottomless. Out of all the dishes the ceviche was...

Poor food and service, and extremely arrogant in dealings.

We ate here a couple of times due to the endless complaining on Facebook about people cancelling bookings and drinking without eating. We wanted to support local business. The wait staff were distracted and not particularly friendly, the food was OK.

We ordered a pizza delivery with them. It arrived cold and had obviously been stored vertically as the entire top of the pizza was in a ball at one end with a bald base. Literally the worst pizza I've had delivered, we binned it.

I appreciate they are not a pizza delivery company, but when we emailed them the day, the response we got from Jacob was just "noted". No apology, nothing.

I followed up saying we weren't looking for free food or a refund but that his response was rude and dismissive. Got a couple more grunts in response. How hard is it to be nice to your customers?

After I posted this review, Jacob personally tracked me down on social media and started verbally abusing me. He then deleted his messages.

RESPONSE TO THE OWNER'S COMMENT BELOW: No I didn't post this review a year after the events, I posted it at the time, maybe editing changes the dates. And, again, you had the opportunity to either apologise or respond to the situation/criticism and you again chose a...